Alice Desert Festival to downsize

The program for this year's Alice Desert Festival will be downsized because the organisers are trying to refocus the event.

As part of the changes, the community choir Asante Sana's popular event in Ormiston Gorge and the Desert Voices concert will not be included in the program.

It follows the cancellation of the festival parade last year.

The festival manager, Joe Pickett, says he is going to focus on fostering new talent.

"Staff and the board and through a lot of community consultations as well have been looking at what the new model might be and this year in order focus on time on creating the new incubator model we are having a smaller, downsized festival," he said.